Trump Would Cut How Much?

He’d cut taxes by THIS much.
(Shutterstock photo)

There are some big scary numbers in Donald Trump’s tax plan:

Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump’s tax plan would cost an eye-popping $12 trillion over 10 years, according a new estimate that runs directly counter to the billionaire’s pledge not to increase the deficit with the proposal.

The conservative Tax Foundation, which has been scoring candidates’ tax proposals throughout the race, found that Trump’s changes to the individual tax code would add $10.2 trillion to the deficit using traditional scoring methods, his corporate tax cuts would add $1.54 trillion and his proposal to eliminate the estate tax would add another $238 billion.

$12,000,000,000,000 over ten years isn’t exactly chump change.

That’s the good news.

The bad news is, at least under the Tax Foundation’s traditional scoring, is that Trump would add $1.2 trillion more to the deficit each year, on top of the $400 billion to $900 billion or so already baked into the budget each and every one of the next ten years.

And that’s before Trump gets his way on greatly expanding Washington’s commitment to spending on health coverage. By comparison, Bernie Sanders — the socialist — would add about $1.6 trillion each year.

Bernie of course comes at these huge deficits from the spending side, while Trump gets there from the revenue side. If I have to choose, I’ll choose Trump — but that kind of debt is unsustainable.

There is of course a simple solution: $1.25 in spending cuts for every $1.00 in tax cuts — and before too long, Washington is back to the size it was meant to be.